[Mr.V.]

Can anyone tell me what current drain we are likely to experience running big power 24th scale cars ?
We are setting up a new club with a 5 lane wooden braided circuit and need to sort out power supplies man enough for the job.
Would 13.6 volts and 22 amps be sufficient to run 2 lanes - this effectively would give us 11 amps per lane.
I know a lot of clubs use considerably lower amps than that !
Any advice would be appreciated.
Thanks

 

[RichD]

My local commercial raceway had 6 amp breakers for each lane and even Group 7 cars did not pop those, so I expect that 11 amps per lane will be enough. Will the track be braided? I would not run high draw motors with copper tape. Be sure to use at least 14 gauge wire.

 

[300SLR]

Hi Mr.V
What sort of big power 24th scale cars are you talking about?
Group 12 motors (like they use in the BSCRA and ISRA 1/24 saloon, BSCRA 1/24 open group 12 and BSCRA 1/32 saloon class) need about 10 amps per lane.
Thicker gauge strap motors (like they use in the BSCRA and ISRA 1/24 and 1/32 Eurosport classes) need double that.
(Group 7 wing cars take even more, but this class is very little used in the UK)

Tracks that use power supplies with digital current meters show these values are about right although I'm told more accurate measurements have been made.

Clubs that use considerably lower amps than that can only run lower current motors.

On commercial raceways it is common practice to use a circuit breaker in the brake line. This is a particularly good idea to protect tracks where controllers are plugged in with three separate plugs or croc clips, so there is a risk of a driver plugging in wrong and shorting out the power supply. As this circuit breaker is in the brake line it is not taking the full motor current, so they often have a current rating considerably lower than full motor current.

 

[Mr.V.]

Thanks for the info and advice.
We have now got everything up and running and we run one 24 amp power supply per lane delivering 14 volts.
This copes with everything we use on our braided track with no problems at all.